{"id":215,"date":"2005-12-30T00:22:19","date_gmt":"2005-12-30T06:22:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/?p=215"},"modified":"2005-12-29T21:22:53","modified_gmt":"2005-12-30T03:22:53","slug":"the-beast-master","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/nada\/dump-duhbya\/the-beast-master\/","title":{"rendered":"The Beast Master"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve long thought that the selection <\/p>\n

of Duhbya, so obviously unqualified for the presidency, by the Radical Right was part of their campaign to prove government feckless and <\/p>\n

worthless. Like putting an idiot in charge of a business you want to run into bankruptcy for tax purposes.<\/p>\n

If that seems a bit off <\/p>\n

to you, consider that the Radical Right is deliberately running up the deficit to “starve the beast.” Why not give “the beast” an inept <\/p>\n

handler? mjh<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

American Prospect Online – The Death and Life of American Liberalism<\/a> By Robert <\/p>\n

Kuttner<\/p>\n

The conservative movement is rooted in a coherent, easy-to-summarize ideology: Government doesn\u2019t work<\/em>, except to <\/p>\n

protect you from terrorists; you deserve to keep more of your own money; cherished American family values, including national security, <\/p>\n

are under assault from liberals. The right has fine-tuned and segmented its rhetorical symphony so that the bass notes rock its <\/p>\n

political primitives while a softer timbre appeals to the moderate ear.<\/p>\n

The right\u2019s famed echo chamber now can \u201cnarrowcast\u201d <\/p>\n

complementary messages to every major demographic group. \u201cFor conservative voters in Peoria,\u201d says Rob Stein of the Democracy Alliance, <\/p>\n

\u201cthere\u2019s something for everyone. The businessman gets it from The Wall Street Journal editorial page. The soccer mom has FOX News. The <\/p>\n

24-year-old beer-drinking guy has Rush [Limbaugh]. The religious right can get the word from Pat Robertson.\u201d<\/p>\n

A movement ideology <\/p>\n

also produces unity. Despite schisms, the right is simply more disciplined. The discipline is reinforced by new forms of patronage — tax <\/p>\n

breaks for the elite, godliness for the base. Worldly sinners among Wall Street Republicans may smirk at the fundamentalists in their <\/p>\n

governing coalition, but are happy to share the bounty. They may privately oppose the immense budget deficits, but the heavily <\/p>\n

Republican Concord Coalition, so publicly alarmed at the (Republican legacy) deficits of the 1990s, is today prudently silent. <\/p>\n

Conversely, social conservatives may wince at the antics and views of Rudy Giuliani and Arnold Schwarzenegger, but the coalition holds. <\/p>\n

Genuine Republican moderates, meanwhile, have been coerced or co-opted into near silence. The resulting legislative unity is also <\/p>\n

unprecedented.<\/p>\n

Finally, there\u2019s a war on, a conveniently permanent one.<\/strong> The right manipulates fear of terrorism <\/p>\n

into public and media acquiescence for a politics that would never prevail in normal times.<\/p>\n

And yet, this overpowering structural <\/p>\n

tilt conceals some surprisingly good news. Despite its immense advantages, the right barely prevailed in the last two presidential <\/p>\n

elections, even against feckless Democratic campaigns. The superior infrastructure just offset the extremism. The country remains <\/p>\n

skeptical about most Republican policies, from Social Security privatization to the assault on the courts. As John B. Judis and Ruy <\/p>\n

Teixeira have documented, potentially liberal groups are demographically ascendant. There is a latent liberal majority, if liberals can <\/p>\n

once again learn to do politics.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve long thought that the selection of Duhbya, so obviously unqualified for the presidency, by the Radical Right was part of their campaign to prove government feckless and worthless. Like putting an idiot in charge of a business you want to run into bankruptcy for tax purposes. If that seems a bit off to you, … Continue reading The Beast Master<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dump-duhbya"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.edgewiseblog.com\/mjh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}